had fallen from him as an omen and a light from heaven how they
were to interpret their present situation, they uplifted, with one
consent, one of the triumphant songs in which the Israelites
celebrated the victories which had been vouchsafed to them over the
heathen inhabitants of the Promised Land:--

"Let God arise, and then His foes
Shall turn themselves to flight,
His enemies for fear shall run,
And scatter out of sight;

And as wax melts before the fire,
And wind blows smoke away,
So in the presence of the Lord,
The wicked shall decay.

God's army twenty thousand is,
Of angels bright and strong,
The Lord also in Sinai
Is present them among.

Thou didst, O Lord, ascend on high,
And captive led'st them all,
Who, in times past, Thy chosen flock
In bondage did enthral."

These sounds of devotional triumph reached the joyous band of the
Cavaliers, who, decked in whatever pomp their repeated misfortunes and
impoverishment had left them, were moving towards the same point,
though by a different road, and were filling the principal avenue to
the Castle, with tiptoe mirth and revelry. The two parties were
strongly contrasted; for, during that period of civil dissension, the
manners of the different factions distinguished them as completely as
separate uniforms might have done. If the Puritan was affectedly plain
in his dress, and ridiculously precise in his manners, the Cavalier
often carried his love of ornament into tawdry finery, and his
contempt of hypocrisy into licentious profligacy. Gay gallant fellows,
young and old, thronged together towards the ancient Castle, with
general and joyous manifestation of those spirits, which, as they had
been buoyant enough to support their owners during the worst of times,
as they termed Oliver's usurpation, were now so inflated as to
transport them nearly beyond the reach of sober reason. Feathers
waved, lace glittered, spears jingled, steeds caracoled; and here and
there a petronel, or pistol, was fired off by some one, who found his
own natural talents for making a noise inadequate to the dignity of
the occasion. Boys--for, as we said before, the rabble were with the
uppermost party, as usual--halloo'd and whooped, "Down with the Rump,"
and "Fie upon Oliver!" Musical instruments, of as many different
fashions as were then in use, played all at once, and without any
regard to each other's tune; and the glee of the occasion, while it
reconciled the pride of the high-born of the party to fraternise with
the general rout, derived an additional zest from the conscious
triumph, that their exultation was heard by their neighbours, the
crestfallen Roundheads.

When the loud and sonorous swell of the psalm-tune, multiplied by all
the echoes of the cliffs and ruinous halls, came full upon their ear,
as if to warn them how little they were to reckon upon the depression
of their adversaries, at first it was answered with a scornful laugh,
raised to as much height as the scoffers' lungs would permit, in order
that it might carry to the psalmodists the contempt of their auditors;
but this was a forced exertion of party spleen. There is something in
melancholy feelings more natural to an imperfect and suffering state
than in those of gaiety, and when they are brought into collision, the
former seldom fail to triumph. If a funeral-train and wedding-
procession were to meet unexpectedly, it will readily be allowed that
the mirth of the last would be speedily merged in the gloom of the
others. But the Cavaliers, moreover, had sympathies of a different
kind. The psalm-tune, which now came rolling on their ear, had been
heard too often, and upon too many occasions had preceded victory
gained over the malignants, to permit them, even in their triumph, to
hear it without emotion. There was a sort of pause, of which the party
themselves seemed rather ashamed, until the silence was broken by the
stout old knight, Sir Jasper Cranbourne, whose gallantry was so
universally acknowledged, that he could afford, if we may use such an
expression, to confess emotions, which men whose courage was in any
respect liable to suspicion, would have thought it imprudent to
acknowledge.

"Adad," said the old Knight, "may I never taste claret again, if that
is not the very tune with which the prick-eared villains began their
onset at Wiggan Lane, where they trowled us down like so many
ninepins! Faith, neighbours, to say truth, and shame the devil, I did
not like the sound of it above half."

"If I thought the round-headed rogues did it in scorn of us," said
Dick Wildblood of the Dale, "I would cudgel their psalmody out of
their peasantly throats with this very truncheon;" a motion which,
being seconded by old Roger Raine, the drunken tapster of the Peveril
Arms in the village, might have brought on a general battle, but that
Sir Jasper forbade the feud.

"We'll have no ranting, Dick," said the old Knight to the young
Franklin; "adad, man, we'll have none, for three reasons: first,
because it would be ungentle to Lady Peveril; then, because it is
against the King's peace; and, lastly, Dick, because if we did set on
the psalm-singing knaves, thou mightest come by the worst, my boy, as
has chanced to thee before."

"Who, I! Sir Jasper?" answered Dick--"I come by the worst!--I'll be
d--d if it ever happened but in that accursed lane, where we had no
more flank, front, or rear, than if we had been so many herrings in a
barrel."

"That was the reason, I fancy," answered Sir Jasper, "that you, to
mend the matter, scrambled into the hedge, and stuck there, horse and
man, till I beat thee through it with my leading-staff; and then,
instead of charging to the front, you went right-about, and away as
fast as your feet would carry you."

This reminiscence produced a laugh at Dick's expense, who was known,
or at least suspected, to have more tongue in his head than mettle in
his bosom. And this sort of rallying on the part of the Knight having
fortunately abated the resentment which had begun to awaken in the
breasts of the royalist cavalcade, farther cause for offence was
removed, by the sudden ceasing of the sounds which they had been
disposed to interpret into those of premeditated insult.

This was owing to the arrival of the Puritans at the bottom of the
large and wide breach, which had been formerly made in the wall of the
Castle by their victorious cannon. The sight of its gaping heaps of
rubbish, and disjointed masses of building, up which slowly winded a
narrow and steep path, such as is made amongst ancient ruins by the
rare passage of those who occasionally visit them, was calculated,
when contrasted with the grey and solid massiveness of the towers and
curtains which yet stood uninjured, to remind them of their victory
over the stronghold of their enemies, and how they had bound nobles
and princes with fetters of iron.

But feelings more suitable to the purpose of their visit to Martindale
Castle, were awakened in the bosoms even of these stern sectaries,
when the Lady of the Castle, still in the very prime of beauty and of
womanhood, appeared at the top of the breach with her principal female
attendants, to receive her guests with the honour and courtesy
becoming her invitation. She had laid aside the black dress which had
been her sole attire for several years, and was arrayed with a
splendour not unbecoming her high descent and quality. Jewels, indeed,
she had none; but her long and dark hair was surmounted with a chaplet
made of oak leaves, interspersed with lilies; the former being the
emblem of the King's preservation in the Royal Oak, and the latter of
his happy Restoration. What rendered her presence still more
interesting to those who looked on her, was the presence of the two
children whom she held in either hand; one of whom was well known to
them all to be the child of their leader, Major Bridgenorth, who had
been restored to life and health by the almost maternal care of the
Lady Peveril.

If even the inferior persons of the party felt the healing influence
of her presence, thus accompanied, poor Bridgenorth was almost
overwhelmed with it. The strictness of his cast and manners permitted
him not to sink on his knee, and kiss the hand which held his little
orphan; but the deepness of his obeisance--the faltering tremor of his
voice--and the glistening of his eye, showed a grateful respect for
the lady whom he addressed, deeper and more reverential than could
have been expressed even by Persian prostration. A few courteous and
mild words, expressive of the pleasure she found in once more seeing
her neighbours as her friends--a few kind inquiries, addressed to the
principal individuals among her guests, concerning their families and
connections, completed her triumph over angry thoughts and dangerous
recollections, and disposed men's bosoms to sympathise with the
purposes of the meeting.

Even Solsgrace himself, although imagining himself bound by his office
and duty to watch over and counteract the wiles of the "Amalekitish
woman," did not escape the sympathetic infection; being so much struck
with the marks of peace and good-will exhibited by Lady Peveril, that
he immediately raised the psalm--

"O what a happy thing it is,
And joyful, for to see
Brethren to dwell together in
Friendship and unity!"

Accepting this salutation as a mark of courtesy repaid, the Lady
Peveril marshalled in person this party of her guests to the
apartment, where ample good cheer was provided for them; and had even
the patience to remain while Master Nehemiah Solsgrace pronounced a
benediction of portentous length, as an introduction to the banquet.
Her presence was in some measure a restraint on the worthy divine,
whose prolusion lasted the longer, and was the more intricate and
embarrassed, that he felt himself debarred from rounding it off by his
usual alliterative petition for deliverance from Popery, Prelacy, and
Peveril of the Peak, which had become so habitual to him, that, after
various attempts to conclude with some other form of words, he found
himself at last obliged to pronounce the first words of his usual
/formula/ aloud, and mutter the rest in such a manner as not to be
intelligible even by those who stood nearest to him.

The minister's silence was followed by all the various sounds which
announce the onset of a hungry company on a well-furnished table; and
at the same time gave the lady an opportunity to leave the apartment,
and look to the accommodation of her other company. She felt, indeed,
that it was high time to do so; and that the royalist guests might be
disposed to misapprehend, or even to resent, the prior attentions
which she had thought it prudent to offer to the Puritans.

These apprehensions were not altogether ill-founded. It was in vain
that the steward had displayed the royal standard, with its proud
motto of /Tandem Triumphans/, on one of the great towers which flanked
the main entrance of the Castle; while, from the other, floated the
banner of Peveril of the Peak, under which many of those who now
approached had fought during all the vicissitudes of civil war. It was
in vain he repeated his clamorous "Welcome, noble Cavaliers! welcome,
generous gentlemen!" There was a slight murmur amongst them, that
their welcome ought to have come from the mouth of the Colonel's lady
--not from that of a menial. Sir Jasper Cranbourne, who had sense as
well as spirit and courage, and who was aware of his fair cousin's
motives, having been indeed consulted by her upon all the arrangements
which she had adopted, saw matters were in such a state that no time
ought to be lost in conducting the guests to the banqueting apartment,
where a fortunate diversion from all these topics of rising discontent
might be made, at the expense of the good cheer of all sorts, which
the lady's care had so liberally provided.

The stratagem of the old soldier succeeded in its utmost extent. He
assumed the great oaken-chair usually occupied by the steward at his
audits; and Dr. Dummerar having pronounced a brief Latin benediction
(which was not the less esteemed by the hearers that none of them
understood it), Sir Jasper exhorted the company to wet their appetites
to the dinner by a brimming cup to his Majesty's health, filled as
high and as deep as their goblets would permit. In a moment all was
bustle, with the clank of wine-cups and of flagons. In another moment
the guests were on their feet like so many statues, all hushed as
death, but with eyes glancing with expectation, and hands
outstretched, which displayed their loyal brimmers. The voice of Sir
Jasper, clear, sonorous, and emphatic, as the sound of his war-
trumpet, announced the health of the restored Monarch, hastily echoed
back by the assemblage, impatient to render it due homage. Another
brief pause was filled by the draining of their cups, and the
mustering breath to join in a shout so loud, that not only the rafters
of the old hall trembled while they echoed it back, but the garlands
of oaken boughs and flowers with which they were decorated, waved
wildly, and rustled as if agitated by a sudden whirlwind. This rite
observed, the company proceeded to assail the good cheer with which
the table groaned, animated as they were to the attack both by mirth
and melody, for they were attended by all the minstrels of the
district, who, like the Episcopal clergy, had been put to silence
during the reign of the self-entitled saints of the Commonwealth. The
social occupation of good eating and drinking, the exchange of pledges
betwixt old neighbours who had been fellow-soldiers in the moment of
resistance--fellow-sufferers in the time of depression and
subjugation, and were now partners in the same general subject of
congratulation, soon wiped from their memory the trifling cause of
complaint, which in the minds of some had darkened the festivity of
the day; so that when the Lady Peveril walked into the hall,
accompanied as before with the children and her female attendants, she
was welcomed with the acclamations due to the mistress of the banquet
and of the Castle--the dame of the noble Knight, who had led most of
them to battle with an undaunted and persevering valour, which was
worthy of better success.

Her address to them was brief and matronly, yet spoken with so much
feeling as found its way to every bosom. She apologised for the
lateness of her personal welcome, by reminding them that there were
then present in Martindale Castle that day, persons whom recent happy
events had converted from enemies into friends, but on whom the latter
character was so recently imposed, that she dared not neglect with
them any point of ceremonial. But those whom she